


The Ghost of St. James

by DestielsDestiny



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Also Crowley can see ghosts, Angsty Crowley (Good Omens), Costume Parties & Masquerades, Crowley-centric (Good Omens), First Kiss, Follows show canon but set in the 1990s, Gen, Good omens halloween exchange, Halloween, Halloween Costumes, Hurt Crowley, I'm not telling who it is but see if you can guess!, M/M, Mixes book and show canon, Oblivious Aziraphale (Good Omens), POV Crowley (Good Omens), Pie, Protective Aziraphale (Good Omens), Surprise Cameo, Which should be a much larger plot point for a much longer fic but there is it
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-29
Updated: 2019-10-29
Packaged: 2021-01-06 06:15:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Major Character Death, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,500
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21221927
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DestielsDestiny/pseuds/DestielsDestiny
Summary: When he finds himself summoned on All Hallows Eve, it is all the Fallen Crowley can do not to sigh loudly. Because honestly, do humans lack any imagination at all.Or, the one where true names are spoken, ghosts are as real as angels and demons, teenagers can be very cruel, nobody can quite tell what Aziraphale is dressed up as, and Crowley would really rather not spend Hallowe’en chatting with actual, real ghosts.





	The Ghost of St. James

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Miele_Petite](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Miele_Petite/gifts).

The Fallen Crawly, One of the Six-Hundred Sixty-Six, First Tempter of Humanity, Serpent of Eden, was on the hunt.

For a decent bottle of alcohol. It didn’t have to be a good vintage.

For Someone’s Sake, at this point, it didn’t even need to be _wine_.

It just had to be wet, and at least ten percent alcoholic.

“I must say Crowley, I didn’t expect this party to be my cup of tea at all, as it were, but it really is quite splendid, isn’t it.” Aziraphale appeared to be having the time of his life, for all that the Young’s little cottage was far, _far_ too small of a space to stuff any amount of teenagers into, never mind the scores of half-grown youngsters currently running about in improbably stitched together costumes, sloshing punch all over everything and being generally _boring_.

Aziraphale, due to the happy circumstance of _never_ being their designated driver, had started drinking before they left the bookshop.

Between that and the happy accident of discovering Deidre Young had been a literature professor once upon a time, his angel was downright _glowing_ with excitement.

Newt had thought the caricatured devil mask was hilarious when he dropped off their costumes. Crowley had not shared the sentiment, but then, in Crowley’s book at least, if the Antichrist asked you to wear something, you wore it. Even if he looked like a cross between Darth Vader and Long John Silver, including a glittering, silvery monstrosity of a full-face mask.

But in that moment, hunching his shoulders to fit through one of the Young’s cramped doorways, Crowley felt a burst of intense gratitude for the covering.

Because if his face split into a helpless grin at the sheer happiness exuding from his angel, that was between Crowley and this uncomfortable mask, now wasn’t it.

“Yup, just _ss_plendid.” The sarcastic hiss was far more affected than it would have been moments before. Making Aziraphale happy had always brought joy to Crowley’s heart, and six millennia had done little more than intensify that feeling with each passing year.

And teasing his angel was so very delicious, even if only just to see the world’s most adorable pout spread across his half-concealed features. “Now Crowley, I know this is hardly your usual scene, but for Heaven’s sake, don’t go tempting anyone now—” Crowley gave an exasperated huff, rolling his eyes behind the mirrored lenses of his mask—a minor, miracled alteration of his own devising.

“Really Angel, I wouldn’t dare.” He really wouldn’t, but that had more to do with the Antichrist being in the next room than anything else. And if he’d been debating for the last hour whether to explode the punch bowl all over the carpet, well, chances were the young ones would find it hilarious. Warlock and his mates certainly had in the past.

Aziraphale side-eyed him over his eye-mask. The room was well lit, and the artificial light glinted off the large purple glass gems glued to the thing with an eye-popping intensity. “Angel..._what exactly_ are you supposed to be dressed as again?”

Crowley felt he deserved some sort of commendation for restraint.

He’d resisted asking that question all _week_.

Aziraphale puffed up adorably, the psychedelic fake plumage admirably imitating the posture his wings would assume if they weren’t, as ever, safely stowed away from human perception.

“Why Crowley, I should have thought that was obvious—” Crowley never did get to hear the end of that sentence, so rapid was the horribly familiar tugging, ripping feeling that suddenly surrounded his person.

Crowley had always hated being summoned, from the first moment a human had managed it, all the way back in 1000 BC or so. Still, he usually tolerated it with a certain equanimity these days, particularly as the current goth craze meant it was nearly a weekly occurrence.

It was fun to scare the idiot teenagers who usually did the deed, clutching a crumpled print out of summoning instructions in wax flecked hands, mouths gaping open at actually having snared a real, live demon.

But more than half the time, he had to save them from burning whatever deserted graveyard or abandoned barn they used to the ground with themselves inside, so flicking the occasional forked tongue at them was the height of the mischief he got up to at said idiots expense.

Usually. But usually, he wasn’t standing less than a foot from his angel when this sort of thing happened.

Thus usually, he missed the flash of sheer _terror_ that entered Aziraphale’s ancient eyes in the instant before he was spirited away against his will _again_.

Hence, this time, unluckily lucky idiots or not, _heads would roll_.

GOGO

Crowley’s determination to accomplish this is stymied in rather short order.

In part because _this_ particular group of would-be demon hunters, while undoubtedly teenagers, and equally undoubtedly idiots, were _very_ lucky idiots.

So luck that they not only got the summoning circle _right_, they also, Hell only knew how, got their hands on his _true name_.

Crowley barely has time to take in his surroundings—darkness, broken only by the flickering of faint lights across water...and was that _bloody St. James Palace _in the distance—before he was _slammed_ into the ground with a force that clacked his teeth together, sending blood bursting through his mouth with a tangy bitterness.

“Fallen Crawly, we have summoned you to fulfill our deepest, darkest desires!” Crowley swallowed a mouthful of iron, flicking his tongue into the air in the same moment—candles, even damned sage, but not sulfur. Just human idiots then. Very, _very_ lucky ones, but still—“Deepest, darkest desires? Where did you get that tripe from, a bloody YA novel?”

There was a brief, stunned silence. Crowley took the opportunity to pry himself up from the ground, kneeling up in the frigid October air, his knees crunching painfully in the gravel beneath his denim clad legs.

There were at least three of them that he could see, arrayed around an intricately laid out circle of candles and spray paint, laid out on—“Is that newspaper?” Idiot one audibly swallowed in the face of Crowley’s incredulous cry. “Did you idiots actually go to the trouble of finding a proper, hellish summoning ritual strong enough to hold one of the _sixty-six_ and then _spray paint the runes on used newspaper_?”

If the henchmen had more terribly unoriginal lines to spout, or even, wonder of wonders, perhaps some actual, honest to god holy water to throw at him, Crowley never found out.

For in that moment, flickering into view beyond the candle flames, the ghost showed up.

GOGO

Crowley had never precisely found out _why_ he could see the spirits of the departed. As far as he knew, it was a _gift_ unique among even the Fallen. Not that he’d ever exactly done a survey or anything to check that.

But he just _knew_ that if any other demon, or Hell forbid _Hastur_, had such an ability, they would never cease to use it to torment humanity with. Nor cease crowing about their ability to do so.

Crowley, well. Crowley mostly tried to ignore the ghosts, when they came. And it wasn’t like in the movies, thank Someone. They didn’t follow him around constantly, wailing and moaning, or even just watching.

It was just, sometimes, when he saw people, he didn’t just see the ones that were alive.

This was no different, the slightly spectral image of a pale pre-teen staring squarely at him, unblinking and still.

Water dripped from the boy’s mouth, running down his sodden shirt, forming a puddle around feet clad in bright red wellies.

Crowley felt something curdle in his belly, as it always did when the ghosts were young.

Idiots one, two, and three didn’t seem to enjoy his utter inattention.

“Now see here, Fallen Crawly—” Pain shot through Crowley’s chest as the words formed, and he braced his fingers against his knees, his teeth gritting behind his mask.

Something _flickered_ across the ghost’s face, in the same moment a clear, youthful voice cut through whatever idiot one had been about to decree. “Really _Philip_, I would have thought such childish games were beneath even your intelligence.”

Crowley barely spared the newcomer a glance, enough to take in tangled dark hair and a long, dark coat. His eyes remained riveted on the ghost boy’s face, such was the look of utter, utter _heartbreak_ in the child’s eyes.

Idiots one, two, and three were circling the newcomer now, whose tongue appeared sharper than his fists could back up. The ghost drifted closer, and Crowley felt himself tense involuntarily.

This _never_ happened. The spirits of the dead were usually only too eager to avoid interacting with such a tainted creature as he.

The puddle at the boy’s feet began to expand, lapping at the edge of the closet newspaper.

Crowley blinked in astonishment, as the summoning circle abruptly sputtered, its power fizzling out of existence with a terrific bang.

All of the candles went out.

The three original teenagers jumped.

Crowley at them in the faint light of the moon, weighing whether to chance it.

Aziraphale would say it was too risky. But Crowley was so very beyond fed up at this point.

And it was Hallowe’en after all.

He banished the mask from his face with the barest of thoughts, his eyes flashing yellow in the darkness, his tongue flicking out in a hiss more terrible than even the one he’d thrown in Gabriel’s face, that day in Heaven.

The teenagers scattered into the night with gratifyingly high-pitched screams of terror.

All but the last, who studied Crowley for a moment longer, seemingly utterly unperturbed, before melting into the darkness, almost as silent as his ghostly shadow.

The little boy hadn’t moved from his place beside the now defunct summoning circle. Didn’t so much as blink as Crowley banished the sodden remains with a flick of his hand.

Crowley’s heart hurt from something beyond the lingering echo of his true name being spoken.

“What’s your name, lad?” He’d never addressed a ghost before.

Perhaps it was foolish of him to expect an answer.

But just as Crowley was about to turn away, the ghost turned his head towards the trees where the last boy had vanished into the darkness, his face wet with something that might have been tears.

_Redbeard. _

It was so faint of an echo, Crowley might have written it off as a trick of the wind.

If there had been even a whisper of a breeze that night.

Green eyes seemed to bore into his soul, and Crowley swallowed a lifetime of bitterness at his inability to _do_ anything to help.

He had never been good at it, suffering. Neither inflicting it nor watching it.

With a last flicker, Crowley is once again alone, with only the dark stillness of midnight in St. James’ Park for company.

GOGO

His angel comes soaring to the rescue just as Crowley is miracling himself a fresh devil mask, sword brandished in one hand, flames dancing up and down the blade, threatening to catch his fake feathers alight with every grand arc of the weapon.

He’s trailed by a fairly good approximation of War, a green Chewbacca, a large ice cream cone, a vampire, and a dog in a wolf costume.

Crowley blinks at the display for a moment, adjusting his mask in bemusement.

Six pairs of confused eyes blink owlishly back at him. “Crowley...I thought you were in danger!”

Crowley has been falling for his angel for six thousand years. But his heart never ceases to skip a beat, in the face of such _love_.

“I’m all right angel, I pro_miss_e.” He flicked his tongue out for emphasis, scenting the cool night air, the far-off wail of approaching sirens. “But perhaps we should put out that sword before we wake up the Queen herself, yeah?”

Aziraphale looks adorable when he’s bashful. It is also possible that Crowley always finds Aziraphale adorable, no matter what he’s doing.

“Oh, of course.” Aziraphale extinguishes the flames. Crowley assists in putting out a few of his fake feathers.

The vampire snaps his fingers as War muffles a suspiciously scornful, “lovebirds!” behind their cough.

Appearing out of thin air in the middle of a fireworks display was not _precisely_ how Crowley and Aziraphale had planned to help Adam explain the existence of all things supernatural to his very human, and at least one half very conventional parents.

But they drive home with half of one of Arthur Young’s pumpkin pies held carefully in Aziraphale’s lap, so on balance, Crowley doesn’t think it went _too_ badly.

If only largely because Deirdre Young is a stone cold badass.

Stating that out loud naturally earned him a scandalized look from his angel, “Really Crowley, there are children present!” But he suspects it also made him Adam’s new favourite godfather, so he’s counting that one as a win too.

GOGO

Crowley can’t bring himself to speak on the drive home. Aziraphale, showing a glimmer of the perceptive clarity he exudes towards Crowley’s moods more and more with each year past NotArmageddon, allows the silence, broken only by the occasional rustle of foil and parchment as his angel steals a bite of pie.

When they arrive at the bookshop, Crowley keeps his gaze deliberately lowered, unwilling to look out into the night, lest any tipsy party goers or industrious trick-or-treaters might be abroad. He’s seen enough ghosts for one evening, fake or otherwise.

Aziraphale sits in silence for a moment longer, before miracling a fork and offering Crowley a bit of pie, “It really is scrumptious, my dear, you must try it.” He sounds so very earnest, no doubt having resisted the urge to feed Crowley at traffic stops the entire trip.

If only because Crowley never actually stops for said traffic stops.

Crowley regards the fork with its morsel of flaky pie for a long moment, his eyes strangely wet behind his mask.

The pie gets mushed hopelessly between them, his plastic horns scraping against Aziraphale’s purple bobble things, but it is still as a sweet a first kiss as any that ever was or will be.

After all, never before has a kiss been so many eons in the making. And never again is one ever likely to be.

And when Aziraphale takes his hand and leads him inside the bookshop, for once, Crowley’s vision is clear of ghosts or regrets.

And his grip, where his fingers twine with his angel’s, is strong and sure.

Because he may be The Fallen Crawly, One of the Six-Hundred Sixty-Six, First Tempter of Humanity, Serpent of Eden.

He may be unforgivable.

But for this moment, for every moment that has come before and every moment that will come after, until the world undoubtedly ends in a shower of ignorance and bureaucracy, he is Aziraphale’s Crowley.

Always has been, and always will be. 

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [[Podfic] The Ghost of St. James](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27230647) by [Djapchan](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Djapchan/pseuds/Djapchan)


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